Creator makes best hands

A workshop which brought together doctors, engineers, computer experts and others also showed how little is known about the way hands function. Professor George Bekey of the University of Southern California told the workshop that ‘gripper’ mechanisms can be built with today’s technology.

Others pointed out that human grasp involves much more than just gripping. Grasping an object normally includes use of sight, memory, and sensors on the skin. ‘If you are going to pick up sledgehammers, type at a terminal, and then stroke someone on the head,’ Professor Bekey said, ‘you need a single hand that can do all three of those things, and that’s difficult.’

The Australian, 10 July 1990, p. 41.

Evolution hall clash

Conflict has broken out over a $2.5 million evolutionary exhibit hall in San Francisco.

The exhibit is called ‘Life Through Time—The Evidence for Evolution’. It has been built by the California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park to show the evidence for evolution. Giant insects, carefully modelled dinosaurs, and lush gardens feature in the exhibit.

But many people are complaining because the exhibit presents the theory of evolution as fact. Louis Sheldon, from a conservative Christian group, says ‘Evolution is a theory. And spending more than $2.5 million to try to prove that evolution is a fact leaves the motives of those promoting the exhibit very questionable.’